"Ted! Teddy! Theodora McAlister!"
Theodora was passing the Farringtons' grounds. At the third call, she
looked up. Billy, on the piazza, was waving his cap in one hand and
pounding the floor with one of his crutches with the other.
"What's the matter?" she called, at a loss to account for these vigorous
demonstrations.
"Come up, and I'll tell you," he shouted. "Hurry up about it, too."
"Is the house on fire?" she demanded in feminine alarm, as she turned
and sped across the lawn.
Billy laughed derisively.
"If that isn't just like a girl! It's nothing of the kind, Ted; it's
good news."
"What a scare you gave me, you sinner!" She dropped down on the step
below him and fanned herself with her hat, for it was noon of an August
day. "What is your great news, anyway?"
"Uncle Frank is sick again."
"But I thought you said it was good news," Theodora said, in some
perplexity.
"So 'tis. Wait till you hear the rest of it. He isn't dangerous, only
comfortable; but the doctors say he'll die unless he goes up into the
mountains. He won't go unless mamma goes, and so she's going."
"But for the life of me, I don't see anything so very good in all that,"
Theodora said again.
"It is very solemn and serious so far, for he's really awfully ill, and
mamma doesn't want to leave me, and she feels that it is her duty to
go," Billy answered, trying to subdue the rapture written in every line
of his face. "Now we're coming to the good part,--good for me, that is,
for I don't know what you'll say to it. She is going to be away for six
weeks, and I'm to be at your house."
"Oh, Billy, how splendid!" Theodora's tone left no doubt of her
sincerity. "When are you coming?"
"Day after to-morrow. Mamma had a letter, this morning, and she's been
in a great pickle about it. She felt she ought to go, for there isn't
anybody else; but she couldn't take me. I'm not up to mountain climbing
just yet, and she was bound she wouldn't leave me alone. Finally, I
suggested going to your house, and that struck her as a good scheme.
She's had a long session with your father and mother, and it's all
settled, unless you veto it."
"I'll be likely to. Now we shall have a chance to work on our play."
"And to develop our pictures," added Billy, who just now was suffering
from an attack of the photographic mania.
"Yes, dozens of things. We can do so much in six weeks."
"The worst of it is," Billy remarked pensively; "I'm sure to have such a
fine time of it at your house that I can't seem to get up much regret
over my mother's departure."
"You'll be homesick enough," Theodora predicted. "Wait a week and see."
Two days later, Mrs. Farrington took the morning train for New York,
where she was to meet her brother and go with him to the Adirondacks.
Billy stood on the steps to wave her a farewell; then he slowly crossed
the lawn towards the gate which had been cut through the fence under
"Teddy's tree." For the next week or two, he and Theodora were busy from
morning till night, revelling in the thousand and one interests for
which the days had been all too short, when they were obliged to take
their meals and to sleep in places six hundred feet apart.
One golden September day, Billy and Theodora were out under the old
apple-tree, hard at work on the play which they had long been planning
to write. It was to be given on the following Christmas; and the parts,
written to order, included the three older McAlisters, Billy, and Archie
who had promised to come East in time for the holidays. There was need
for strict division of labor. Billy, more familiar with theatres, was
able to supply the stage craft and the plot, while Theodora padded the
skeleton and covered the dry bones of his outline with sonorous speeches
over which she was forced to pause, now and then, to smack her lips.
"'Die, villain, die; and drink the cup of retribution for all your
sins!'" she read. "How does that go, Billy?"
"All right. Do I say that, or does Hu?"
"Hu. Poor Uncle Archie! Then he tumbles over with a whack and dies in
Hope's arms."
"What kills him? You never do half kill people, Ted. You take too much
for granted."
"Conscience. No; Hu, that is, Sir James, shoots him."
"I remember now. I'd forgotten. I hope Hu's a safe shot."
"He couldn't hit a church, if he tried." Theodora giggled. "What's the
matter, Hope?" For she saw Hope coming rapidly across the lawn towards
them.
"Bad news, dear." Hope's eyes were full of tears. "Mamma has a letter
from Butte, and Archie is in the hospital there, with typhoid fever."
"Hope! Not really?"
"Do they think he'll die?" Billy asked anxiously, with boyish bluntness.
Hope's tears began to fall on the letter in her hand.
"They say he's very ill, and that they felt it was best to write. Papa
says typhoid is always uncertain, and he wants mamma to start West,
to-night."
"Will she go?"
"I don't know yet. She's half wild, for Archie is her only brother, and
she loves him so."
"Don't we all?" Theodora questioned impulsively.
Even in the midst of her tears, Hope blushed scarlet.
"Not in the same way, Teddy," she said gently. "You know they were all
alone with each other for so long. I hope she will go."
"It would be better if I weren't here," Billy said thoughtfully.
"No; you're like one of us, Billy, and it's easier, with you here to be
sorry for us," Hope said gratefully, for she had been quick to realize
the sympathy in his look and tone. "Besides, it may not be so bad.
Mamma, if she goes, may find him better and able to come home with her."
Back of Theodora, Billy stretched out his hand to Hope and pressed her
hand in silent token of understanding and pity. Nothing increases the
power of observation like suffering. Billy's long months of helpless
idleness had taught him to read the faces and moods of the people about
him as a strong, active boy could never have done. He had fathomed the
true state of affairs between Archie and Hope. He knew how much of
Hope's future happiness, unknown to herself even, was depending on the
outcome of that illness of Archie, and he saw her present pain, and the
brave self-control which helped her to master it.
Mrs. McAlister left for the West, that night The days which followed
were gloomy ones to them all, anxious and busy ones to Hope in
particular, for upon her devolved the care of the housekeeping and much
of the responsibility over Allyn and Phebe who was as fractious as never
before and resented Hope's gentle rule. Two more letters came from the
hospital; but they reported no change. Until Mrs. McAlister could reach
her brother, they could know nothing definite. They could only wait and
hope.
During all these weary, dreary days, it was a comfort to them all to
have Billy with them. It had long been impossible to think of him as an
outsider; but now he came closer to them than ever before, comforting
Hope, helping Theodora to pass the time of restless waiting, cajoling
Phebe into good humor, and entertaining Allyn by the hour. Blithe and
sunny-tempered himself, he kept them from becoming too blue, while the
little care and half-tender, half-playful coddling which the girls gave
him was a safety valve for their tensely-strung nerves.
"I believe I love those old crutches of yours, Billy," Theodora said
impetuously, one night.
He had been unusually weak, all that day. Even now, there were times
when his strength failed him and when, for the passing hour, the old
pain came back to give him a few twinges, as a reminder that he could
not afford to be too careless. He had been lying stretched out on the
sofa with Theodora sitting beside him, while the twilight dropped over
the room. At her words, he looked up abruptly.
"I can't say that I do."
"No; I suppose not. Still, I owe them a good deal."
"I don't see why," he said vaguely, as his eyes rested on her bright
face, just now looking unusually dreamy and thoughtful, while she sat
staring at the long rosewood staff in her hand.
"Perhaps it's selfish," she said, with a smile; "but I've an idea that
if, when I first knew you, you'd been strong and--just like other boys,
I should never have known you half so well. Do you know, Billy
Farrington, I'd just like a chance to fight for you, to do something to
show I'm not a friend just in talk and nothing else."
He laughed at the sudden fierceness of her tone, little thinking how
soon her words would be put to the test.
"I hope you won't have the chance, Ted; but I've an idea that, if ever I
were in a tight place, you'd help me out of it sooner than anyone
else."
"Try me and see," she answered briefly.
Good news came to them, only the next day. Mrs. McAlister had reached
her brother, to find that convalescence had already begun. The attack of
fever had been sudden and sharp; but Archie's fresh young strength had
held its own, and his recovery was likely to be a rapid one.
"I shall bring him home with me," Mrs. McAlister wrote. "He oughtn't to
go back into camp, this fall; and the doctor says that the long rest
will be the best tonic he can have, for he's been working altogether too
hard. If he is able, we shall start for home, next week, and get there
by the twenty-fifth."
Hope sang blithely to herself, all that day, and even Phebe was moved
into a more agreeable mood than was her wont. Allyn took a more
materialistic view of the situation.
"Uncle Archie's going to get well," he remarked to Billy. "Now he can
bring me nonner engine."
For two days, the McAlister household felt that it was living in an
atmosphere of perpetual sunshine. Then the clouds fell again. It was one
Saturday morning. Theodora was at her desk, straightening out the
account of Mr. Huntington's weekly sales, Hubert was playing football,
and Hope had gone to market, taking Allyn with her. Out on the lawn west
of the house, Phebe and Isabel St. John were playing tennis and
wrangling loudly over the score. Left to himself in the house, Billy
threw aside his book, took up his crutches, and went away to the barn,
where Dr. McAlister had given up an old harness closet for his use in
developing his pictures. It opened out of the barn not far from the
stalls where Vigil and Prince were kept; but it was easily accessible
and sufficiently roomy, and Billy had accepted the doctor's offer
eagerly.
Once shut up in the dark in company with his ruby lantern, Billy fell to
work on a picture of Allyn, taken only the day before. So absorbed was
he that it was only vaguely that he heard the voices of Phebe and Isabel
in the barn close at hand. The murmur went on for some moments, broken
by girlish gigglings and little squeals of merriment. Suddenly there
came another squeal, louder, this time, and more earnest; there was an
interchange of swift, low words, and then silence fell, and Billy
dismissed the incident from his mind.
The picture proved refractory and refused to come out. Then at length
Billy gave it up in despair, threw away the developing fluid, cast the
plate into a pile of similar failures, took up his crutches, and started
for the house again. On the way, he met Phebe and Isabel. They looked at
him furtively as he passed.
"What's up, Phebe?" he asked.
"Nothing. I only thought you looked tired," she replied, with unusual
thoughtfulness.
"So I am, of doing nothing. Come in and play casino with me."
"Can't," Phebe said hastily. "We'd like to, Billy; but there's something
else we've got to do."
"All right." And he passed on.
They were all seated at the dinner-table, that noon, when the doctor
came into the room. His face was white and very stern.
"Vigil is dead," he said abruptly. "Do any of you children know anything
about it?"
"I don't," said the twins, in a breath, and Hope echoed them; but Phebe
started and cast a swift glance at Billy.
"Do you, Billy?" the doctor asked, for the glance was not lost on him.
"No; of course not. When did she die?"
"This noon, when I came in, I found her. She was groaning pitifully,
and very weak. I wonder that you didn't hear her."
"She died?" Billy asked sympathetically, for the doctor's voice broke
over the last words. Vigil had been his favorite horse, and together,
man and beast, they had passed through many a tragic night and day. Such
friends cause bitter mourning.
"I shot her, to put her out of her misery," he responded briefly. Then
he turned to Phebe.
"Phebe, do you know anything about this?"
She grew white.
"No," she stammered. "At least, not exactly."
"What do you mean? Do you know anything about Vigil?"
"I--I'd rather not tell."
"Answer me," he said sternly.
For her only reply, she burst out crying, and cast another glance at
Billy. Her father took her hand and led her away to the office.
"Now, Phebe, I want you to tell me about this," he said.
"Oh, no."
"Did you do anything to Vigil?"
"No."
"Do you know who did?"
"N--no."
"Phebe, this isn't a time to shield the culprit. Tell me what you know."
"I don't know anything," she sobbed.
"Were you at the barn, this morning?"
"No."
"Did you see any one go there?"
"No--only Billy."
"Was Billy there?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"About ten o'clock."
"You saw him?"
"Yes; Isabel and I were playing tennis, and I saw him go. When he came
back, I met him, and he looked so queer that I asked him if anything was
the matter."
"Queer? How?"
"Dark, sort of, under his eyes, and--scared."
"Phebe," the doctor looked at her steadily, searchingly; "is this all
true?"
"Yes."
He took a quick turn up and down the room.
"And I thought the fellow was true as steel," he muttered to himself.
"Those eyes ought to be true. Poor fellow! I wish Bess were here to talk
to him."
His face was very gentle as he went back to the dining-room. As soon as
the meal was over, he turned to Billy.
"Come to the office a minute, Billy," he said.
With a look of wonder on his face, Billy followed him to the door. When
they were alone, the doctor spoke.
"Billy," he said quietly; "Phebe says you were at the barn, this
morning."
"So I was," he answered.
"That you were the only one who went there."
"How does she know?" Billy asked easily, for as yet he did not see
whither the doctor's questions were leading.
"Did you see Vigil?"
Then, of a sudden, the truth burst on the boy, and he flushed with
anger. The doctor saw his heightened color, and mistook it for guilt.
"And I trusted you so, Billy," he said sorrowfully.
"Dr. McAlister, do you think I did anything to your horse?"
"Who else?"
"I don't know, and I don't care," the boy returned recklessly. Then,
with an effort, he regained his self-control. "Dr. McAlister," he said,
and his true, honest blue eyes met the doctor's eyes steadily; "Dr.
McAlister, on my honor, I have not been near Vigil, nor done anything to
hurt her. That is all I can say about it."
There was a silence, long and tense. Then, as the doctor made no sign,
Billy turned away and went out of the office.